THE NATIONAL NURSERYMAN 
113 
everybody in the business is a crook, and that he will never buy 
another blooming dollar’s worth of fertilizer or nursery stock or 
automobile tires, as the case may be. And in this case I happen 
to know the reasons why your nursery stock and the services 
you got with it were not always satisfactory. So, if you will, 
come with me 'behind the scenes and see what those reasons have 
been. 
But before we start, let me say right off that one of the rea¬ 
sons has been that most of us buyers have insisted on getting 
the cheapest stock we could find, and then we have kicked be¬ 
cause the cheapest did not turn out to be the best. That is true 
of nursery stock, of course, just as it has been true of fertilizer 
and other things that we have bought. 
However, the more progressive nurserymen have realized for 
a long time that it was their business to educate the consumer 
to the fact that quality was of more importance than low price in 
the buying of nursery stock. And that, incidentally, brings us 
back to the one biggest cause of nursery-stock users’ troubles. 
The industry has not been organized. 
Organization need not mean, and in itself usually does not 
mean, anything like monopoly; but a total lack of organization 
always does mean unlimited cutthroat competition. 
You dairymen and fruit growers and live-stock men who still 
have fresh in your memories the good old days before you had 
your selling organizations, do not need to be told at any great 
length what the result of such competition is. 
It means that the buyer sets the price, and it means that, com- 
peition being almost wholly on the price basis, quality and ser¬ 
vice are at a discount. It means, too, that the fellow who fills 
his milk can too near the well, or uses a stovepipe to get the 
small apples in the middle of the barrel, or fills his orders for 
McIntosh apple trees with Ben Davis stock, or with stuff he has 
not grown himself and cannot be sure of, is going to make it im¬ 
possible for the man who does not want to do these things to 
compete with him on a faii'-for-all basis. It also means discredit 
to the whole dairy business, or fruit business, or nursery bus¬ 
iness in the eyes of the general public. 
In addition to this, too, the good nurserymen have been up 
against another brand of competition which has also tended 
wrongly to put the emphasis on price rather than on quality— 
that is, the competition with foreign stock grown by cheap for¬ 
eign labor. While our lawmakers, down in Washington, have 
seen to it that the country’s “infant” industries, such as steel, 
cotton, and textiles, were carefully sheltered by a high and thick 
protective tariff, they have left the nurseryman to take care of 
himself. 
Competition of this kind has been particularly bad for this 
particular business, because, in the first place, in buying nur¬ 
sery stock, one must, to a large extent, buy “sight unseen,” and 
it may be years before the result of that purchase is discovered, 
and there are no fixed standards to go by. Quality in trees and 
shrubs is not altogether a matter of caliper height and breadth. 
The most progressive, honest nurserymen have realized these 
things for many years, but as individuals they have been help¬ 
less to correct the evils which they knew existed. And, as has 
been the case with almost all organizations, getting the majority 
to agree to some of the reforms which were needed has been a 
long, hard job. At last, however, a substantial start has been 
made. The decent nurserymen who want to give their customers 
a square deal are organized nationally, and have the upper hand 
over the others now, and there is every indication, that many 
of the old questionable practices will be eliminated. 
The progressive nurserymen realize the basic truth of the prin¬ 
ciple that the seller’s obligation to the buyer does not stop when 
the sale is made, but that with the contract of sale there goes a 
certain obligation of service, which means that the seller is 
morally bound to see that the customer gets satisfaction from 
what he has bought; also, that he be shown how to use it most 
efficiently if it is a machine, and how to take care of it success¬ 
fully if it is a plant. 
With this end in view the more progressive nurserymen 
formed, a year ago, a voluntary national organization to carry 
on an educational campaign. This work was begun in a modest 
way during the spring and summer, and when the American 
Association of Nurserymen met in convention last June, they de¬ 
cided, in a resolution adopted almost unanimously, to take over 
the work of this organization, and finance it from the funds of 
the American Association. 
This work, so far, includes the supplying of educational ar¬ 
ticles to country newspapers, the preparation of illustrated lec¬ 
tures, for the use of granges, schools, etc., on home fruit-growing 
and decorative planting; the preparation of two small books on 
home landscaping and fruit-growing by Dr. Bailey and Professor 
Hendricks, and similar activities. 
But the leaders in this movement have realized that the ed¬ 
ucation of the public was not the only thing needed. They are 
also endeavoring to educate their own members to grow and sell 
stock of the highest quality. The beginning has been made to¬ 
ward putting these higher standards into practice by employing 
an executive secretary, one of whose chief duties will be to work 
out this problem. 
It is planned, eventually, to use an association trade mark 
wich will stand for quality and service that the consumer, no 
matter how small his order may be, nor how little experience he 
may have had in the buying of nursery stock, can absolutely de¬ 
pend upon. 
So earnestly did the delegates to the national convention de¬ 
sire to make sure that the American-grown nursery stock of the 
future will be as good as the best that can be grown anywhere 
in the world, that they provided for the appointment of a com¬ 
mittee to see to it that a course in’nursery practice be included 
in the work of the leading agricultural colleges in the United 
States, so that scientifically trained men. with high ideals for 
their profession, may be provided for the future. 
All these things, of course, are but steps in the movement to 
make a “more fruitful and more beautiful America.” They are 
only a beginning, but they are a good, solid, substantial begin¬ 
ning which cannot fail to mean the providing of better nursery 
products for you and me. 
As to prices for nursery stock, it is not likely that they will 
ever again reach the old low level. Not only does labor form 
such a laige pai t of the cost of production, but it is also impos¬ 
sible to use machinery to offset the increasing cost of labor as 
has been done in so many other lines of industry. 
However, prices for nursery stock in the past have often been 
below the actual cost of production, just as they have for many 
other perishable soil products. Nursery stock that is ready to 
sell must be sold, or be put on the brush pile to go up in smoke. 
The Amei ican Association of Nurserymen has sought the aid 
of the Department of Agriculture to help nurserymen with sta¬ 
tistics and data on the industry which will be of assistance, just 
as the crop and price reporting services of the Bureau of Mar¬ 
kets has been of assistance to the individual farmer in his own 
business. The nursery industry, from its very nature, can never 
be “monopolized,” and “profiteering” is not to be feared. 
THE AMERICAN ROSE ANNUAL 
The Official Publication of the American Pose Society 
There is something about the American Rose Annual 
that makes it differ from most other reports or official 
publications ol Societies. Generally such works are of 
little interest except to the few. The American Rose An¬ 
nual seems to be the American Rose Society itself. It 
gathers up all about roses from all over the country, in 
fact all over the world and presents it to the reader in a 
concise readable form. It not only makes you acquainted 
with the new and unusual in roses, but the history and 
oiigin oi the old favorites, about the different species 
from which they originated. It brings to you rose infor¬ 
mation from every angle and makes you acquainted 
with all the rose enthusiasts of the country, what tliev 
are doing tor the development of tlit' queen of flowers 
and how they are doing it. 
Mr. J. Horace McFarland, the Editor has evidently the 
genius of acquiring the cooperation of all the leaders 
who are interested in the rose and having them contri¬ 
bute their knowledge so as to make a very complete sum¬ 
mary of all that is happening in the rose world. As a 
book of rose progress it would be hard to beat. 
The membership fee in the American Rose Society is 
only $2.00 per year which entitles them to all publica¬ 
tions including the Rose Annual, admission to all exhi¬ 
bitions and to vote at the meetings. 
Apply to G. A. White, Secretary American Rose So¬ 
ciety, Ithaca, New York. 
